Why companies need to walk the talk on employees bringing their "whole self" to work

Many conversations are happening about “back to work” (aka BTW) after Covid-19’s interruption and the “work-from-home” (aka WFH) of the past two years. Employees learned what worked and what didn’t, micro-managers struggled to evaluate productivity over the interweb (as my mom calls it), and CEOs served shareholders “pivots” or “reframed” the old version, buffed to a Mr Min shine.

The tensions are real — leaders want to justify high rentals for high-rises and workers can’t seem to vibe with the 60-minute commute, rising petrol prices, and angry yellow-line-busting taxi drivers. Working from home, they learned to recite asanas in their proper Sanskrit names and to “Namaste” that one colleague overly eager to drive team-bonding by forcing all to “turn on cameras”. Grhhhh.

The BTW call isn’t “adding joy”. Absence, in this case, did not make hearts grow fonder. As one who helps leaders build future-ready businesses, I am eager to see what is around the bend. Hopefully, not Covid 2.0 or Bumble Swindler 4.0, but rather a reform of these destinations of commerce into inclusive spaces for human beings (in all their myriad forms). That’s not a lot to ask, right? Wrong! It turns out that some “woke” leaders are champions of linguistic gymnastics.

The pressure on workers to pretzel themselves into being “culture fit” remains. Whose culture? What is a fit? If we are as colourful as the rainbow, then work culture cannot be a one-size-fits-all. For all the ways in which “work” advances in perceptually democratic ways, the lived reality differs — especially for those who are in marginalised communities...

Herein I insert a motivation for my tribe: “the childfree female professional” (aka CFP). Childfreeness among women has garnered attention globally. However, little is said about the CFP in our wonderful and wounded land. Bodily autonomy is enshrined in our constitution, yet scant attention is paid to the CFP — whether at work or in amapiano tracks, movies, reality shows, or big-brand ads, they are MIA, dololo, as in nada, nix! Instead, the childfree female is often stereotyped, a demonised figure too sad to be funny and too selfish and ambitious to be caring.

At worst, she’s the pitiful one for whom options, which were once plump grapes, have now shrunk like raisins in the sun. I can see the head of People/HR rushing to review policies to find that one line that mentions the childfree as a special-interest group... Mmhhh, it’s not there. Therefore, please lower the volume on the “you can bring your whole self to work” vibes and fix this omission. How dare you speak DEI (diversity, equity, and inclusion) and yet not see this erasure as a slight? Would I start a revolt by suggesting in my outside voice that CFPs should use this “oversight” as a bargaining chip and refuse the BTW call?

After all, if HR really wants folks to “live the values” and “walk the talk”, as well as “attract and retain best-in-class female talent”, then best they craft policy to embrace all sorts, parents and childfree alike. HR can influence the workplace culture of inclusivity so that it’s imbedded as everyday organisational practice. And here’s the clincher — the erasure of the childfree is not just a matter of feminism; it also affects the survival of organisations.

The skills, intellect, and experiences that exit the organisation when the childfree feel unseen and/or are repro-shamed* are crucial to the efforts of any commercial enterprise to prosper. It also flies against the efforts of BBBEE (you know this one).

Now, more than ever, our country needs all shoulders to the wheel to kick our economy back to life. Maybe not full throttle yet, but at least the heartbeat can register on an ECG machine. A luta continua...

*A term I’ve coined: the childfree are repro-shamed based on their reproductive choices and negatively stereotyped as defective, selfish, shallow, and unfulfilled.